Dream Residue

Boobie Gibson is a strange, halfway sort of thing. He’s like a splinter over which a full inch of skin has grown. He is old enough now that Cavs fans no longer harbor delusions about what he could be, though what he is, exactly, is indeterminate, like we’ve been peering down the road for so long, expecting him to appear in the distance, a fully realized incarnation of our hopes for him, that we make a startled yelp when we look to our right and realize he’s been riding shotgun the whole time. Boobie Gibson, at this point in his career, functions more as placeholder than player. He is unique as a memory-conjuring figure. As a player, he’s interchangeable with a handful of smallish combo guards who can knock down an open three-pointer. His game is not dissimilar to Courtney Lee’s, though Lee inflicts painful memories where Boobie reminds us of the childhood of what was supposed to be a championship team. Do you remember when the Cavs lost to the Spurs in the NBA Finals, and you thought This team is much better than I expected, and they have so much room to grow? Boobie Gibson was part of that, one of the parts that was supposed to grow.

He didn’t, really. He’s not Ray Allen, it turns out. Instead, he’s an inch deep in the pad of our thumbs, buried beneath newfound hope but still visible. He’s still, persistently, a part of right now. I’m happy he’s here, though I’m not sure why. Here’s a game for you: try to come up with a Boobie Gibson memory other than him dropping 31 points on the Pistons in game 6 of the Eastern Conference Finals in 2007. Surely, you’re not thinking of anything that has happened in the past two years, over which Gibson has struggled to remain in Byron Scott’s rotation due to nagging injuries. You’re not likely to recall his performance in the 2009 Playoffs, when he played a total of six minutes during the first three games of the Eastern Conference Finals against Orlando. Maybe his regular season game-winner against OKC in 2010? His “Yessir!” head shake was in full effect after that one. Remember when he shaved a star into his head? That was pretty cool. Or at least mildly idiosyncratic.

Perhaps your aptitude for the Boobie Gibson Memory Game is higher than mine, but if someone were to ask me about him, I would have very few stories to tell. (Though, bonus track: here’s a clip of him play-fighting with Mo Williams. I really miss that team, you guys.) I would say only that I love him, and that it’s the same stale but curiously poignant love one has for things that spoke to them in high school. Then I would talk about his little brother-big brother relationship with LeBron and feel wistful.

The Cavaliers are entering their second summer of inspecting their roster, consulting the map Chris Grant has tattooed on the underside of his tongue, and pruning players accordingly. Boobie Gibson could be one of those players. (He’s got a team option for $4.8 million next year.) He likely won’t be expelled from the team for the boring reason that unless the Cavs splurge this offseason, he’s still going to be one of their ten best players. If you see a lanky dude with long brown hair holding a “Boobie Gibson is still on this team, and I’m pretty okay with it” sign at the Q this season, that’s me. (I’ll also be wearing “This hurts me more than you can imagine, but I really need you to suck, Jonas” body paint. I’ll be easy to spot.)

Empirically speaking, Boobie Gibson is the type of player you’re pretty okay with having on your team. He can knock down an open three about as well as anyone in the league and isn’t a disaster on the defensive end. He is capable, intermittently, of pouring in buckets as if possessed by a higher power. He will win your team between two and zero games per year. I worry about his ability to stay on the court.

Empirically speaking, Boobie Gibson is boring. But he is, persistently, part of right now. I don’t want him to leave, and I think I know why. If it’s all the same in terms of talent—are the Cavs getting anything better at the ninth spot of their rotation than a smallish combo guard who doesn’t miss open threes?—then we should embrace the difference between what Boobie Gibson means as opposed to what he is. Along with Anderson Varejao, he is the last remaining Cavalier who was present when Cavs fans’ dreams burned a bright shade of purple, when that feeling of This team has so much room to grow! was still palpable. Unlike Varejao, he is young enough (he’s 26) to participate in this new Post-LeBron Cavalier rebuild experiment. He cannot realize the unrealistic expectations we allowed ourself to bestow upon him, but he can help. If 31 year-old Boobie Gibson is the veteran on a Cavs playoff team, spelling Brad Beal for twelve minutes a game, and maybe giving a few “Yessir!” head nods after catching fire in the middle of a third quarter against the Bulls, I’ll be unspeakably happy. The dream died the day LeBron decided to leave for Miami, but the thing about dreams is they come back to you in fragments. Boobie Gibson is one such fragment; it would be ideal if the Cavaliers could rebuild the dream around him.

10 Responses to “Dream Residue”

GREAT article…you really captured my feelings about Gibson: I don’t necessarily think he should stay (although I don’t object to it), but I can’t seem to let go due to his reminders of the fun, LeBron-era Cavs teams.

well in my only opportunity to watch the cavs this season, (live in new jersey since I had no TV) Boobie was a mature court presence and single-handedly provoked Deron Williams into a temper tantrum through defense. He didn’t have much impact other than that since his shot wasn’t falling but he’s someone I feel a lot better about having in the locker room than worrying about if we’re overpaying.

Completely agree with this article. The last few sentences actually gave me the chills. I love the image of Gibson being a contributing veteran on a cavs playoff team in the future. I hope we hold onto Gibson, just because I miss that old cavs team so much. It’s the same reason I still follow Mo and Delonte even though they’ve both been traded. Assuming that Andy will probably be traded at some point, it would be nice to at least have one piece of that team left for when we finally have a hopefully solid playoff caliber team again. Another great article though

I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t keep him really. He has a discernible skill…is fairly young…but still a veteran and good locker room presence…

Plus, he’s been building to his game since he came into the league. Sure, he’s not ever going to be an All Star or transcendent talent, but his only mistake has been getting injured thus far. Actually, I saw a lot of good things from him this season. He seemed to regress on the defensive end after the ankle injury, but he also seemed to do much better (comparatively at least) at finishing inside and at making plays for teammates.

I still would like to see him improve in the playmaking area and become Kyrie’s backup. It doesn’t play to his best skill set of shooting the 3, but there’s worse things to have than a backup PG who is a knock-down 3 point shooter… And he’s better than any of the other guys we’ve had play the position…can you think of another guy we had last season who would be a better backup PG? Sessions is the only one that is debatable, but I would still argue that Gibson is better on D and they’re fairly interchangeable overall.

One of my Gibson memories actually was him leading the Cavs bench and scrubs against the 76’ers starters (including Andre Miller) and coming to within 1 shot of winning in overtime in a game that absolutely didn’t matter. It wasn’t the best-played game by any stretch of the imagination, but there was no doubting his dedication to the game after that.

That game did matter Dave. They were going to tie the record for the most home wins in a season. Records matter, because teams that want to be permanent — IMMORTAL — care about records, and leaving their names in the history books. Mike Brown and LeBron never understood that. I contended that game DID matter, and that if we’d have played our starters that game and gotten the record, we might’ve won a championship that year. Boobie got it.

As for Boobie, Andy, Gee… We root for players. We care about players. We’re not rooting for the logo. You watch a player grow up, you see him struggle, and when he’s an endearing personality who’s never been anything but a class act the entire time he’s been with the team, you want him to succeed, and you want to keep following him. If the players are interchangeable, then you’re just rooting for the logo on the shirt. You’re just rooting for laundry.

How many teams in the NBA would willingly put Gibson in their respective 9 man rotations. My guess is that most would take him in a heart-beat. Gibson has a place and a role, on multiple levels, as mentioned above. Considering the lack of overall talent on the current Cavs roster, we should feel blessed to have him. What we need to do is create sufficient team depth that serves to keep Gibson(and Verajoe) healthy throughout an entire season. This is the only way to get maximum production from both these players.

I’ve always liked Boobie, and still do. He works on his game every off-season and becomes better at some element. I’m hoping that right now he’s working on his ball hadling and passing skills so that he can be ‘the’ backup for Kyrie and also get some minutes as a backup SG. I think he knows he’s never going to be an all-star, but he also knows (and is willing) to contribute to a team the best way he can. The ideal of a 31 year old Boobie being a veteran leader on a championship caliber Cavs – I hope Grant makes it happen.

I feel the same way about Boobie. I like him even though he never had a whole lot of memorable on-court success. But he’s a good guy and great underdog, which is why we’ve put so much emotion into cheering for guys like Christian Eyenga, Luke Harangody, and Manny Harris.

It would be amazing to watch Varejao and Gibson, the lone reminders of the most intriguing era in Cavalier history, as veteran role players leading a new group of young stars to accomplish what their former star never could.

Boobie can be a Steve Kerr type player for the next 10 years if he were only to stay a bit healthier. He is a much better defender than Kerr, and not quite as good of a shooter, but he is absolutely a guy that could earn important minutes on a great team. He will never be true PG, but as long as we don’t ask him to be, he can very much help the team.

And as usual, for whatever reason, people love to talk about trading Andy. We are not going to trade him, folks. He is not that old, and we would never get equal trade value for him. We will compete for the playoffs next year and certainly the year after that. Why wouldn’t we want to have a top bigman in the league with a beautiful contract? We were health and a wing player away from already being a playoff team, though clearly not one with championship aspirations. If we have a good draft, and in my fantasy world, pry Harden from OKC when possible (he will receive a Max offer when eligible and the Thunder won’t be able to match it) in a couple years, we could be winning big. Andy is as good as Chandler, but way cheaper. We can’t give that away for some above average player and protected number 1s that we would likely receive in a trade for him.

The Lineup: (Click for Author’s Archive)

Nate Smith is an Associate Editor. He grew up in Anchorage, Alaska, and moved to NE Ohio in 2000. He adopted the Cavs in 2003 and graduated from Kent State in 2009 with a BA in English. He can be contacted at oldseaminer@gmail.com or @oldseaminer on Twitter.

Tom Pestak is an Associate Editor. He's from the west side of Cleveland and lives and (mostly) dies by the success and (mostly) failures of his beloved teams. You can watch his fanaticism during Cavs games @tompestak.

Robert Attenweiler is a Staff Writer. Originally from OH, he's long made his home in NYC where he writes plays and screenplays (www.disgracedproductions.com) some of which end up being about Ohio, basketball or both. He has also written for The Classical and the blog Raising the Cadavalier. You can contact him at rattenweiler@gmail.com or @cadavalier.

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